Monday, July 09, 2007

A great parody in today's Liberty Times singing the praises of the Taiwanese examiners who used literary Chinese to ask a math question in this year's university entrance exams. Taiwanese nationalists have been trying decrease the amount of literary Chinese used in high school textbooks while Chinese cultural conservatives lead by the poet Yu Kwang-chung have resisted fiercely. Yu, it should be noted, was a staunch enemy of the then-new Taiwanese literature of the 1970s and an excellent example of reactionary Chinese culturalism masquerading as liberal humanism.

Sunday, July 08, 2007

Taiwanese Fertility

Interesting map from Taiwanese blogger Richter's Maps Talk showing Taiwan's 2005 Total Fertility distribution. Jianshi Township, a heavily Atayal district in the Hsinchu mountains has Taiwan's highest total fertility rate of 2.61 births per woman. The map shows that relatively high fertility rates are clustered in Taiwan's mountain districts. White areas on the map show total fertility rates of < 1. Kaohsiung City's Cianjin District has the dubious distinction of having Taiwan's lowest total fertility rate--0.73. The Taipei basin also appears to have a lot of white areas.

These statistics corroborate my sense that Taiwan's First Nations are experiencing something of a renaissance--non-Han villages has noticeably more kids in them than the sad farming communities down on the western plains. It also underlines the very real cultural and social differences between the Han and indigenous Taiwanese that are surprisingly (to me anyway) strong despite decades of assimilationist policies.